Page 79 of Winter’s Teeth

Shira bit into her lower lip, holding back an amused chuckle. “Okay then. Noted. Can you three help me and Corbin carry stuff back to the car now? We’ve gotta get going.”

Angie hesitated to pull away, her big, watery eyes lingering on me. “What are you going to do, Rae?”

Fox’s voice carried down from above where he leaned over the banister. “She’s going with me. We’re going back to the cabin to get to Everly. I’ve got a plan to get past the guards this time.”

My eyes narrowed. “Eavesdropper.” How long had he been up there listening? The purple, floral-embroidered sweater was gone, replaced by a sweatshirt with the Wisniewski fishing store’s logo on it. Presumably, he’d been gone long enough to raid Ben’s room.

“And you’re a blabbermouth,” he countered, pushing off the banister to make his way down the stairs. “Just wanted to know how much you were going to tell them so I can be prepared when it hits the papers next week.”

“We’re not gonna talk,” Ben argued.

“Speak for yourself,” Riss huffed. “I’m gathering all the evidence as soon as we’re back to get these supposed monsters locked up for good. Prison or a lab, I don’t care.”

Shira tensed, as did Fox when he paused on the bottom step.

“You’ll leave Fox and Corbin out of it, right?” I hedged.

Shira added nervously, “They’ve got other cousins who should be left out, too. They’re not all bad. It’s not a sin to be born in a family of monsters.”

Only a sin to be a monster, I thought ruefully. Which Fox and Corbin were not. They might have had the talents and makings of monsters, but they themselves hadn’t crossed those lines yet.

Riss took an exceptionally long time to answer, stretching out the silence to the point that I feared what went on behind those cold, calculating eyes. When she at last griped, “Yeah, fine, not everyone,” I almost wept for joy.

Corbin wandered back in as soon as the tension passed, oblivious to the conversation we’d been having. “You guys ready?” He clutched handheld radios in both hands, carrying a canvas bag of other supplies over his shoulder. “The walkies are good to go.”

Shira cleared her throat, not so covertly mumbling, “Radios.”

“What?”

“Radios,” she said again under another cough. “Not walkies.”

Riss’s eye twitched again, this time ticking in her eyebrow as well.

Fox breezed past us to grab a radio, his scent kicking up in the air under my nose. I inhaled deeply, catching a hint of the cranberry hand soap from the bathroom upstairs.

“What I want to know,” Riss said, “before anyone goes anywhere, is how you two are making it back to the cabin. I mean... Look at the state of you.”

I glanced down at my frame. Dirt and briars clung to my torn snow pants. My hiking boots had seen better days, and the hastily wrapped, dirt-smeared bindings around my knee were a nice touch.

Fox looked no better with cuts and scrapes all over him, the worst of which were on the right side of his face from his cousin pushing him into a foot of water to grind his face against the creek bed.

“We may be beaten and bruised,” I drawled, “and we may never escape the consequences of what began tonight...” Sliding my hand into Fox’s, I continued, “But we’re not dead yet. There’s too much left to fight for.”

“You’ve got us, too,” Angie added with a scared, small smile. “I know we can’t go with you, but we’ll be waiting, and if things go south, we’ll charge in.”

Ben snorted. “You’re gonna charge in, Ange?”

Angie dipped her head. “Well... You and Riss probably will. I’ll call for backup.”

Riss rolled her eyes. “Just tell us the plan. Where are we gonna wait?”

Corbin held out his phone with a map on the screen. “Here. Along the highway closest to the cabin where they’re keeping Everly. We’ll stake out along there until we hear otherwise from Rae and Fox.”

“We’re just gonna sit there all day?” Ben complained.

“Trust me, there’s lots to do in the meantime,” Shira said. “I might send some of you to get more supplies. We’re gonna need to get a safehouse ready once we get Everly and the others out. It’s not like they can go back home and pretend like nothing happened. It would be too easy for Arthur or the others to find them again.”

Safehouses, supplies, plans upon plans... My head spun out of control, but seeing Riss’s look of determination gave me some peace. My job was to get Everly out, and they could handle the rest.